Dodge Retort: Steve Jobs, a few encounters of my own

Steve Jobs would have to be at the top of anyone’s list of American innovators and pioneers. Not just modern day, but over a century or more. His name belongs next to Edison, Bell, Ford, Franklin and his long time pal and nemesis, Bill Gates.

Jobs was brilliant, tyrannical, funny, driven and many other things that typify game-changers. He will be endlessly eulogized over coming days and weeks and written about for years and decades. What I can uniquely offer are a few encounters I had with Jobs and the perspective of someone who has covered computers and IT since January, 1980.

Steve was crazy like most visionaries. Many thought his brilliance would be limited to the Apple I and Apple II. His follow-up to those creations was the expensive and clunky Lisa, which used this insane input device called a mouse used to point at and click on desktop icons. Little did we know….